A Middlesex Superior Court hearing slated for tomorrow should — should, we emphasize — result in a decision allowing the state Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission to replace Timothy Bassett as chairman of the Essex Regional Retirement Board.
But if this out-of-touch Essex County-based public pension agency has any regard for the retirees it claims to represent — as well as the taxpayers it has all but ignored up until now — it will drop its suit and accept PERAC's decision to name Swampscott Town Administrator Andrew Maylor as new chairman of the embattled retirement board.
Rather than spend additional thousands of dollars in legal fees defending Bassett's right to serve as chairman and executive director — a clear conflict of interest — the board should finally relent, so that all tied to this quagmire can finally move forward.
That, of course, is a lot to ask of a panel that's long been stacked with Bassett cronies, and until recently operated with virtually no public scrutiny. But the board has, simply put, brought its problems on itself.
With multiple reform measures already filed on Beacon Hill, it's clear that change is on the way. And that change should bring about the demise of those board, which has already turned over much of its meaningful management to PERAC as demanded by the towns and agencies it represents.
Ultimately, this board's legacy will be of a public-sector panel that fought much longer and harder to protect its own interests than the interests of the town workers and pensioners it represents — and far more than the interests of taxpayers.
There was the shameful $500,000 perk that Bassett secured for his own retirement, and the panel's ludicrous efforts to stonewall any effort at public transparency — in part through throwing taxpayers' money down the drain on obstructionist legal fees.
Then, there was the scheme to allow public-sector employees to pad their Social Security money by signing on as if they worked for one day with the state-affiliated Manchester Housing Authority — a scheme allowed and endorsed by Manchester Housing Authority executive director Joanna Graves.
Still, as tomorrow's court hearing looms, it offers one final chance for board members Bassett, Glenn Morse, Katherine O'Leary and William Martineau to do the right thing, back off their legal challenge, and — for once — let this change go forward.
It's a change that is long, long overdue.
